What story is Eileen FitzGerald reporting on?

Ah, what?

Danbury school officials met last night to discuss how it would manage with $2 million less in 2010-2011.

Those proposed cuts have been sent around through the Parent Teacher Organizations today.

But school officials continue to work on a new plan that they will present to the City Council education subcommittee tonight at City Hall.

So, parents should understand that some of the proposed cuts have already been amended and that the list continues to change.

I'm assuming that this post from News-Times education reporter Eileen FitzGerald came about from my blog posting I did hours earlier on the proposed closing of Mill Ridge Intermediate School (MRI), the elimination of full time kindergarten, and layoff of teachers. The problem here is that, by her claiming that the "proposed cuts have already been amended and that the list continues to change", FitzGerald is trying to sugar coat the situation. In fact, although she knew about the recommendations from the Board of Education's Building Utilization Committee, and the contents of the letter from PTO President Brian Walsh, FitzGerald didn't mention details of the cuts until today's front page story.

The Danbury leaders propose eliminating full-day kindergarten classrooms, prompting a cut of 5.5 teachers and 11 paraprofessional positions.

It includes restructuring Mill Ridge Intermediate School, which includes cutting 6.5 positions from among a principal, secretary, media specialist, language arts teacher, nurse, and two custodians. As part of plan, the King Street Primary and Mill Ridge Primary schools would add third grades, and fourth- and fifth-graders normally assigned to Mill Ridge would go to King Street Intermediate.

The problem with FitzGerald's post (and reporting in general) is that contrary to what she stated in her post, the PTO informed parents about the accelerated closing of MRI at the meeting (which came about due to the major's rejection of the board of education's original budget request). This news is nothing new to teachers or anyone who has followed the board of education's budget process.

In short, a number of parents and teachers reached out to me because they are VERY upset with the overall reporting from the News-Times when it comes to education in general. People are equally upset over the News-Times lack of coverage when it comes to reporting on concerns regarding the makeup of the Education's Building Utilization Committee, the history of tensions between the school board and city council.

FitzGerald knows what's going on and since being the she's the education beat reporter, she has a responsibility to report on what's happening AS IT HAPPENS (minus the sugar coating). Unfortunately, this is not the case and in the end, residents are not being informed about what's really going on at the board of ed and city hall.

I mean, we're only talking about something that takes up over 50 percent of the city's overall budget.

...more on this topic later.